This headline may strike well at home in the US, but it reflects the arrogant, self-centered, group-think that has become the hallmark of the US. To be sure, there are many lobbies that will applaud this decision, lobbies such as, Right-wing Republicans, the Tea Party, right-wing Jewish and Christian groups and of course, there is always India. To these groups, any bashing of the “nucular, trrrrst” Pakistan is a welcome development.

Of course, Pakistan does deserve a swift kick in the behind and often, but this is not the time to do so. A sudden cutting off of aid reinforces the unreliability of the US as a friend and partner; the US has been complaining for long that the US-Pakistan relationship is a transactional one and by treating it so transactionally right now, the US is telling Pakistan…the civilians and the military… that the US cannot be trusted when Pakistan needs a friend and if Pakistan sacrifices its own long-term self interests in favor of US short-term goals, then the destruction of Pakistan will be complete.

Conventional thinking in the US is that Pakistan is not doing enough to fight “terrorism”. As if to throw the kitchen sink at Pakistan, the US (Adm. Mike Mullen, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff) is publicly accusing Pakistan of the brutal murder of Pakistani journalist Saleem Shahzad.

Saleem Shazad.
Indeed, Saleem Shazad may have been murdered by military interests, but he could have been equally killed by any number of other authorities or groups. Adm. Mullen destroyed a lot of US capital by accusing “Pakistan” of the murder without substantiating his accusations in any way at all. Mullen also accused the ISI of the murder, but in a more coy manner “(I do not have strong evidence of ISI involvement”), does that mean he has some evidence? To parse his words a bit more, if he accuses Pakistan but not the ISI because he lacks “strong evidence”, does he have “strong evidence” of Pakistan’s involvement in the murder?
Slinging accusations and demanding “more”, to issue subliminal warnings greatly undermines US credibility, among the Pakistan establishment, civilian and military, who lose face in a face-driven society.

Is Pakistan doing “enough”?
To the Pakistanis this means that the US is demanding greater slaughters of Pakistanis by Pakistanis. The US does not appear to appreciate the huge numbers of Pakistani soldiers who have been sacrificed at the American alter of revenge. Nor does the US appear to care about the tens of thousands of Pakistani civilians killed by US forces and drones, in the quest to kill “terrorist suspects”.

The fact that the Pakistani soldiers are being forced to kill their own brethren and in some cases, their own relatives, is enough to alienate many soldiers and civilians who are thus, being driven into the arms of the extremists in droves. People are tired of watching their own be slaughtered simply because they were “suspects” in the eyes of distant evaluators who remain unaccountable; no law-abiding nation on Earth, is expected to thoughtlessly kill people simply on the basis that they are “suspects”; neither charged, nor tried, for their presumed “crimes”. People are tired of having innocent civilians be killed as “collateral losses”, without any concern…again, nowhere in the law-abiding world, are innocent civilians sacrificed, simply to kill some “suspects”. The picture below illustrates the depth of the pain felt among Pakistanis when people are arbitrarily killed by US forces. Notice the weeping men in the background? The picture was taken after a drone attack killed many civilians.
While Pakistan’s population is mostly literate, they are not stupid, they do understand that Pakistan is being used as a disposable razor; in a country where loyalty is everything, The US is losing more and more friends with its blind, biased arrogance. I feel confident in saying that never in history, has any nation made more enemies than the US has made, in the past ten years…and all because of the blind arrogance that comes with being the sole major power in the world.

Regardless of who is leading Pakistan or, whether the Pakistan military has power or not; regardless of American short-term needs, Pakistan has to think of its long-term interests. Pakistan’s long-term interests lie in the triangle of relationships between itself, Afghanistan and India…and to some extent, Iran.

While the Kashmir on-again, off-again war is being fought between India and Pakistan, Pakistan cannot permit any leadership in Afghanistan that supports India; for Pakistan, any Afghan government must be either for Pakistan or, neutral (a difficult objective). The US, on the other hand, wants a completely acquiescent Afghan government and supports Indian influence, over Afghanistan, rather than Pakistani influence. The US has also forgotten the fact that the extremists are a product of the first anti-Soviet war in Afghanistan and a creation of CIA-sponsored interests, but that is a different story.

The US is unwilling to recognize the fact of Pakistan’s needs that will remain long after Afghanistan is relegated to American history books. As such, the US continues to demand sacrifices of Pakistan, that Pakistanis can see, are detrimental to Pakistan and are in fact, responsible for tearing apart, the fabric of Pakistan.

Pakistan is also very worried that the US personnel inside Pakistan are doing more than just look for enemies; The concern is that the military and civilian, overt and covert US “assets” in Pakistan are actively seeking to locate sites of Pakistan’s nuclear arsenal with the idea of perhaps a series of simultaneous raids like the one that killed Osama Bin Laden, to capture the nuclear assets of Pakistan. It would not be unimaginable that the US would do this in concert with India and perhaps, even will some degree of collaboration with Israel. US assets in Pakistan have gone beyond control, I doubt if anyone in Pakistan knows how many there are, where or who. In such a situation, especially when the US is openly making noises about the security of Pakistan’s nuclear bombs and in face of reports that the US is making contingency plans regarding Pakistan’s bombs, it would understandably panic the military and civilian leaderships in Pakistan and they would star opposing US assets being stationed in Pakistan…as they just did…which led to the American embargo on the aid commitments of about $800 million.

Where will this development take US-Pakistan relationship?
Pakistan might start restricting US drones or, US forces or, Pakistan might do a “go slow” on US supplies heading to Afghanistan. Any one of these options would cause more damage and greater downward spiraling of the relationship. The US should recall that the last time the US placed an embargo on Pakistan military aid and stopped assisting Pakistan even in training, it lost almost all influence with the emerging leadership of Pakistan’s military. This break in relationships is also responsible for a lack of mutual understanding and mutual cooperation between the US and Pakistan’s military.

There is no need for the US to take the hammer to Pakistan and while it may win temporary points with the American public, the US will damage its relationships with Pakistan so seriously, that re-building it might become a huge job.
Caution would be in order.

An excellent article overall. However, one question that I have often been asked and I ask myself too is that, “isn’t it time that Pakistani military and civilian leadership seriously start weaning itself from US dependence?” After all US never actually pledged to look after anybody’s interest except its own and has times and again proven by her conduct that all alliances are for convenience. My hope is that maybe, just maybe, this time Pakistan can resolve to stand on its own two feet. It will be tough, I have no illusion to the contrary but remember Pakistan did manage to build the bomb despite the opposition of all including the mighty US.

Indeed, Pakistan does need to wean itself from American largesse but that is hard to do with corruption that is as widespread as it is in Pakistan’s civilian and military structures.
The thrust of my article is not that US should continue paying Pakistan, it is that the US should not have made this aid cutoff into the public circus that it did. I believe that the US has hurt its credibility and trust prospects even more, by treating Pakistan in such a cavalier manner.
The US could have had a great role in promoting real democracy and honesty in Pakistan, but that is not in America’s best interests. What we Americans want is a strong man who will continue to kill Pakistani’s at American orders and will contiue to allow the US to kill Pakistanis…while allowing the US to deliver the occassional slap to Pakistan. Terrible as Pakistan’s military and civilain leaders are, they are not YET, at the same depth as the boot-licking leaders to be found in the Middle East…not yet anyway.

Great article. I hope Qaseem is right. There are reasons to be optimistic. After all India went through its breaking point during the 80’s, and came out strong. Unfortunately Pakistan is facing worse crises as it is an occupied country.

Still, I think this crises has hurt US more than Pakistan. It is stupid and very immature to embarrass an ally as critical as Pakistan. Obama might find that the whole OBL drama was in the end his biggest blunder. He lost Pakistan, and with it the war, and the murder of Bin Laden didn’t translate into election victory either.

This lays out the reasoning behind the feelings I had reading the original article.

And how can we focus all these demands on Pakistan without once referring back to the flood that was as great as the tsunami and Haiti combined? That has to be an enormous ongoing drain on all resources, for people, for business, for arable land. We turned our backs on that crisis. The arrogance you define is also a lack of compassion.

About

Blogger Jafar “Jeff” Siddiqui is an American Muslim living in WA.. USA.

He grew up in the Khyber Pukhtunkhwa (North-West Frontier) Province and has maintained close contacts in Pakistan.

He is a member of American Muslims of Puget Sound and is a human rights activist. He is involved with movements for inter-faith understanding. He has contributed articles for a textbook on terrorism, used by US law-enforcement agencies. He has also presented discussions and written article, on the Indo-Pakistan hostilities and their impact on Afghanistan.; he writes articles and gives lectures on Civil Rights, American Foreign Policy, on Islam, on current affairs including events in the Middle East, South and Central Asia. His works have been published in various print media. He also gives commentaries on radio and TV on these subjects.

Occasionally, I use the term “Jihad” in my articles, as the action needed to help make changes to better the ills of society. I often get feedback in which people worry more about my use of the word “Jihad”, than they do about the injustice about which I wrote; some wonder why I would use such a charged word among non-Muslims.

I intentionally use “Jihad”, because I want to jolt Muslims AND non-Muslims; “Jihad” cannot and must not become de-legitimized just because some people do not care to understand the true meaning of a sacred term and decide to associate it with terrible things.

“Jihad” springs from the Arabic “Jhd” which means “struggle”; “Jihad” means the act of struggle, “Mujahid” (Plural, Mujahideen) is someone who is doing “Jihad”.

At the core (the highest level), it is the duty of every Muslim to struggle against the basic negative predispositions we all have as humans…greed, envy, jealousy, rage, deceit, theft, murder etc.

At the next level, it is the duty of every Muslim to fight against the ills that beset Mankind…hunger, disease, homelessness, illiteracy, injustice, lack of water, pollution etc.,

At the least important level, Muslims are required to fight those who attack us AFTER we have exhausted all other efforts towards peaceful resolution. Even then, if peace is at hand, even at mid-battle, one has to stop and accept terms that are just and preserve the dignity of all parties.

I would imagine these are things that every person needs to subscribe to, not just Muslims.

Yet, there is a growing body of opinion in the non-Muslim West, that “Jihad” can ONLY be equated with murder and mayhem and thus, anyone using the word, can be presumed to be associated with supporting murder and mayhem.

I would suggest that supporters of the body of opinion that would like to taint “Jihad”, are people who consider themselves at “War!” with Islam, Muslims and Arabs. They may be a growing number of people, but they are wrong and it would be wrong for Muslims to lend credence to this opinion by shying away from “Jihad” in word, or in action.

Not so long ago, the Jewish organization ADL, launched an attack on some Muslim groups because the Muslims were wearing the Muslim Affirmation… “Shehada” (“There is no God but one God, and Mohammed is His prophet”) on their headbands and the ADL said that the Shehada stood for terrorism.

There are a growing number of bigots who state that Islam’s holy book, the Quran, is a symbol of evil and violence.

What should Muslims do? Abandon the Shehada and the Quran?

Some may say that we should just not use the Shehada on headbands, why not? Either the Affirmation (Shahada) is sacred or it is not; if it is sacred, then wherever it is used, as long as the use is not profane, is also sacred. If the Shehada is used in a profane manner, then the reflection is not upon the Shehada, but on the abuser.

Hitler took the Swastika as his symbol and today, it strikes fear and revulsion in the hearts of many, especially Jews. However, the Swastika is thousands of years old and among Hindus, the “Savas Tika” (“Peace sign”) is a holy symbol, it is used to adorn temples and used by Hindus at almost every occasion…it can be clockwise or counter-clockwise.

Should the Hindus be asked to abandon the Savas tika as a symbol?

If we dared to make such an absurd demand, we would be laughed off the stage.

The Star of David strikes fear and revulsion among millions of Palestinian men, women and children; should the Jews be asked to abandon the Star of David as their symbol?

I am betting millions of Bosnian Muslims shudder a little when they see a Crucifix, or the Christian Orthodox cross, because of the genocide of Bosnian Muslims by the Serbs and the Croats in the name of Christianity in the 1990s; should those symbols be cast aside?

The principle of “use it or lose it” is quite valid here. If we retreat for any reason, we are acknowledging that our sacred and holy terms or symbols are sometimes themselves, evil. Once we give that ground, then we can no longer use our Savas Tikas, our Crucifixes or our terms…THEN, the bad guys have truly won.

I believe that as reasoned and rational people, we cannot allow ourselves to fall victim to populist bigotries. We must look at what the symbol actually stands for, rather than associate it with the negative events that were tied to it by evil people; we must be able to differentiate between Nazi Swastikas on one hand, and symbols and words that are sacred, on the other.

Jihad; it is a sacred duty for every Muslim, Christian, Jew, Hindu…for every human being of good will.